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The Latest Ehab Bullshit

It seems a little churlish to be moaning about our owners when there was an exceptionally serious injury to Ryan Mason during the game last night.

I walked into the pub not long after the collision to see that there was a player seemingly out cold. It took a while to work out what had happened and who it was that had suffered the injury, and I am pleased to note that as I write, he is talking and one assumes that there will be a full, if perhaps lengthy, recovery. Needless to say, I wish him all the best.

Churlish or not, most of this post was written two days ago – I’ve changed the introduction and toned down some of my more lurid outbursts commenting on Ehab Allam’s interview with the Yorkshire Post.

I’ll start with a positive, and despite the amount of bullshit that Ehab proffers, it is still good to hear from our owner – it does seem quite some time since we have last had a respectably lengthy interview him, and it is good to hear his understanding of the current situation – even if it may be almost entirely disagreeable.

Pretty much the first sentence in the interview is “And everyone has been able to see potential buyers at the stadium.”. Jolly good. You have managed to persuade several groups, often Chinese or predominantly so, to come for a jolly at the ground – even at North Ferriby once. Maybe some of them were serious potential purchasers of the club – though maybe not.

This is followed by “But, on the back of some poor results and being in the relegation zone, it is now less appealing for prospective purchasers”. So, Ehab, why do you think we are in the relegation zone? Do you think it has anything to do with the appalling preparation to the season, the forcing out of Steve Bruce, taking 80+ days to appoint a manager, and the last-minute panic signings at the end of August – only one of whom is available to play right now?

Then a beauty, “The transfer window is key”. Shame the one in August wasn’t.

Of course, on the one question most of us want him to answer, he is as evasive as the average guest on the Daily Politics show, “I am not even thinking if it is on hold…” – that clears that one up then. I don’t need to suggest a conclusion as to whether Ehab is trying to sell the club, do I?

Ehab doesn’t take long to kind of apportion some blame for the discord with the fans, though thankfully not going as far as his father did. With regards to the protests, he said “We don’t respond or react because we know it won’t have any positive effect”. Shortly followed by “If you thought people wanted to listen, you may look to engage”. FFS Ehab, what do you think the HCST have been trying to do for the last year or so and repeated again their proposal for discussions last week.

I’ll expand upon their offer and if you are ever in London, I’d be quite happy to go for a roast dinner with you. Maybe we could follow this by taking some ecstacy, finding some hookers and then going to this gay disco night in Vauxhall that sounds ace. Open to alternative suggestions too.

However he clearly is completely closed to the idea of discussing the club with the fans, when he says “I don’t see any point in trying to engage with people who I don’t really think want to listen or understand.”.

Gosh I’ve only just finished page 1. The interview continues with page 2, and I’ll try to present my comments upon it a little more succinctly. The media do rightly get their fair share of criticism (I’m looking at you right now, Daily Mirror), but this is a decent piece of journalism.

There was a certain irony of the sentence, “We have never been a selling club under our ownership” and Jake Livermore being sold shortly afterwards. Will that £10m actually be re-invested? And what has happened to the Premier League money? Given our assumedly relatively low wage bill, why do we have such a small budget? I am not asking for further Allam money to be invested in the club – just the Premier League money and this new £10m.

However he does claim that there will be evidence of him backing our new manager during this transfer window. I will not be holding my breath.

Speaking of our new manager, it is quite instructive when Ebay says, “I felt him being used to small budgets would be a good fit for us”. Quite.

We do get some honesty from him in part 3 when the subject of how he discovered Marco Silva came up, “He applied for the job [in August]. Or an agent did on his behalf, and it is always difficult to know in those circumstances if it is a genuine application or a UK agent trying his luck to get in on a deal”. So as most of us assumed, Ehab has not suddenly discovered a talent for picking future potential managers.

Most fans agreed with the appointment of Marco Silva, and I am willing to give credit where credit is due.

But again we run into some bullshit, “I wanted to look long-term and take a fresh approach – and have someone with us for the longer term. Have a good stint, three or four years.”.

Which I assume is why he was offered a six month contract. Ehab refuses to give details of the contract, but then comes out with some more utter tosh, “But, as you know, I always think long-term. I am not someone who only looks five months ahead”. Then again, he is thinking six months ahead – not five.

Oh and didn’t we miss Snodgrass last night? I was too drunk to concentrate specifically on the game and won’t comment too much upon it – but his guile and creativity, especially from set-pieces, was sorely missed.

He’s so going to be sold isn’t he? That’ll be the long-term vision of Ehab again. Sigh.